Strawberries covered in white chocolate were being heavily advertised in this French Muji. No, she was very much still in France, and so she began her quest to discover that special item, that product exclusive to the French branches of Muji. ▼ Is this really Paris, or did Ikuna somehow get teleported back to Japan? Surely they’d be oozing with French charm!Īs Ikuna entered the store, she was pleasantly surprised at how similar the interior looked to a regular old Japanese branch of Muji. Ikuna was excited to see what kind of stylish souvenirs were on offer at the Muji she’d found in the Westfield Forum des Halles shopping mall. Often when Japanese companies expand overseas they offer regionally exclusive products, usually showcasing a popular item or scene from the area. But Ikuna wasn’t just popping into a French branch of Muji for a quick shop she was looking for some Muji merchandise that was exclusive to France. Our Japanese-language reporter and avid traveller Ikuna Kamezawa recently found herself visiting one such overseas branch of Muji in Paris, France. In fact, such is Muji’s international popularity that there are now more Muji stores abroad than in Japan. Lifestyle brand Muji is loved for its minimalistic yet chic goods, and has gained such a following that there are now branches of the Japanese store in over thirty countries all over the world. It’s sort of like an easygoing home-away-from-home social club, but one that might turn you away based on nothing more apparently substantial than the owner’s whims.Īll we can say is that Umeda Yang Rou Chuan is Umeda Yang Rou Chuan.Parisian branch of Muji is perfect blend of European and Japanese tastes. It’s sort of like a bar, but you have to serve yourself and bus your own table. It’s sort of like a restaurant, but your food options are whatever the owner wants to make, whenever he feels like making it or the skewers that you have to first do the prep work for. So in the end, it’s hard to definitively say just what Umeda Yang Rou Chuan is. and Ikuna were there, with a total of six people, who’d come all the way to the place, being told they couldn’t come in. ” This happened multiple times while P.K. Rather than let them in, though, Ogi turned them away, nonchalantly telling our reporters, “It just didn’t seem like a good match. and Ikuna’s time at Umeda Yang Rou Chuan, a couple, who appeared to be first-timers, showed up. Apparently, though, that’s not the only criteria if you want to eat and drink there, and unfortunately, it doesn’t look like there’s any way to know for sure if Ogi will let you in until you show up at the door. Earlier we mentioned that in order to be admitted, you have to follow Umeda Yang Rou Chuan’s social media accounts. That sounds like a really friendly, open-minded way of running a business…but like with so many other things at Umeda Yang Rou Chuan, there are some complications involved. In expanding on his declaration that he doesn’t want to work, he’s said “I only want to work if it’s for the sake of people and a place I like” and “I think what my customers are paying for isn’t the food, but for the community we have here.” rounds with Ogi.Īll of this ties in to Ogi’s philosophy. There was even a guy whose primary purpose in coming was to go a few Smash Bros. There was a woman who stopped in just to have some food before starting her night shift at work, and much later on a man who stopped in for a drink on his way home. and Ikuna were the first customers of the day, but in time several regulars showed up. ▼ According to the sign on the wall explaining the skewer system, anyone who puts the meat on the sticks gets “all-you-can-eat mutton skewers,” but it’s not clear if that means you can opt out of the 1,000-yen all-you-can-eat-food system and just go all-out on skewers. At Umeda Yang Rou Chuan, it’s the opposite, at least as far as the mutton skewers are concerned. Then, once you’ve got the meat on the sticks, you turn them over to Ogi and he cooks them.Īgain, this runs contrary to what we usually expect at a “restaurant.” Even at grill-it-yourself yakiniku and okonomiyaki restaurants, it’s generally the staff that does the preparation, and the customers who do the cooking. The way the system works is you tell Ogiyou want to do the skewering, and he supplies you with the mutton, skewers, and plastic gloves. … customers who want to eat them have to do the skewering themselves.
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